North Korea U23

The final in Incheon lasted until extra time before South Korea forced it 1–0, and coach Yun Jong-su's side went home with silver. Ri Myong-guk kept goal that night, with Ri Chol-myong running midfield and Ri Hyok-chol leading the line.

The side carries the name Chollima, the winged horse of Korean legend that stands for speed and sudden progress. There is no single founding date to point to, since the squad is assembled fresh for each cycle of the Asian Games and the AFC U-23 Asian Cup rather than existing as a permanent club side; its first traceable match, a 1–0 win over China, came in August 1990.

Beyond 2014, the record reads as a string of quarter-finals — 2002, 2006, 2010, 2018, 2022 at the Asian Games, and 2016 at the Asian Cup. The Olympic tournament itself has stayed out of reach entirely: since the competition adopted the under-23 age limit in 1992, North Korea has never made it to the finals.

South Korea remains the fixture that matters most, sharpened by the peninsula's politics rather than by anything routine in the football calendar, with Japan the other side treated as a genuine measuring stick. Training and occasional home fixtures run through Kim Il Sung Stadium in Pyongyang, though for the biggest crowds the squad has moved across the city to the far larger Rungrado 1st of May Stadium.